Two Rivers Press has been publishing in and about Reading since 1994.
Founded by the artist Peter Hay (1951-2003), the press continues to
delight readers, local and further afield, with its varied list of
individually designed, thought-provoking books.

Join acclaimed poets and teachers Adrian Blamires and Lesley Saunders to explore the lasting influence of Oscar Wilde, playwright, story-teller and victim of prejudice. Be inspired by contemporary artists’ responses to aspects of his life and work, take part in some semi-structured exercises to develop your own thoughts and ideas, and read some of Wilde’s poetry, stories and essays before composing one of your own. Bring something to write on and with. (for Adults 16+).

Steven Matthews will be reading from his collection ‘On Magnetism‘, featuring poems about loss and remembrance, about the relation of the Renaissance and the Classical worlds to our own, about locales within lives. These are poems about sounding the world, and about measuring our responses to it through its various musics. Steven will also be discussing his prose book reflecting upon Wordsworth, ‘Ceaseless Music’.

Fiona Sampson will be reading from ‘The Catch’, a collection that transforms the sensory world into an astonishingly new and vivid poetry. Here, dream and myth, creatures real and imagined, and the sights and sounds of ‘distance and of home’ all coalesce in a sustained meditation on time and belonging. Fiona will also be exploring her prose work ‘Limestone Country’, a love letter to landscape and geology.

Jane Draycott’s beautiful translations of “Pearl” are well known to us. Here, in “Storms Under the Skin,” she exercises a precision of touch that brings Michaux to life as a substantial presence that hovers brilliantly before us, offering its version of the way things work. Michaux is too important a poet to be kept waiting outside. This generous selection brings him into the house of major European poets – George Szirtes

The Poetry Book Society Autumn Bulletin for 2017 features writing from Autumn Choice poet Pascale Petit regarding Mama Amazonica, as well as pieces from Recommended poets Tara Bergin, Douglas Dunn, Frank Ormsby and Michael Symmons Roberts. These are accompanied by comments from the selectors and numerous extracts from their works. The selectors also provide pieces on the Recommended Translation Storms Under the Skinby Henri Michaux, the Special Commendation Selected Poems by Thom Gunn, and the Pamphlet Choice Mr Universeby Rich Goodson. Seventeen short reviews of poetry books for summerreading complete the publication, along with a catalogue of works available for purchase by members at a discounted price.

“Octopus medicine is not a traditional poetry collection; it is three verse-stories about the octopus, interpolated by illustrations, facts, figures and instructions to the reader. It is doing something new. And it is doing it remarkably well….

…These verse-stories may be read alone but they also need to be read aloud, animated, orchestrated, painted, performed, and recorded. They are enthralling, dynamic and utterly captivating.”

Get yourself a copy of both the review and Becci Louise’s Octopus Medicine: the story of an octopus who dreams of stars, a self-important fisherman who gets what’s coming to him, and a misunderstood monster. Octopus Medicine is an invitation to adventure for misfits, outsiders, the lonely. These three verse stories call us down into an octopus world where days are dark, everything’s out to eat you, and nothing’s what it seems. Written for young and old alike, this is a collection for reading at bedtime, acting out on playgrounds, for sharing with grandparents. In its mysterious way, the octopus has much to teach us all.

Two Rivers Press author, Duncan Mackay, says “Tonight I am at Durham Cathedral with Professor Christian Liddy of Durham University to present a paper called New Commons for new times: whispers of better things. This will be followed by a public debate chaired by BBC North East’s political editor. I am weaving much of the history in Whispers into the speech and offering a plug for the book. The debate is focussed on the 800th anniversary of the 1217 Charta de Foresta the companion to Magna Carta.

“A bit of insider info. for you, too: Claire Dyer’s the sort of person who shares her chips with you, makes sure you have a seat in a crowded room and introduces you to everybody. She also has wonderful hair with happy curls. Call me a weirdo, but I think generosity of nature and sparkle of smile beneath happy hair are the sort of things that leak into a person’s writing. Do buy the collection!

I had the pleasure of meeting Claire at the South Downs Poetry Festival, where she facilitated a workshop on first and last lines. I’ve just dug out my notes from her workshop and I’ve written:

“First – shocked lulled find something of yourself

Last – surprise, but also make you want to read it again”

Let’s have a look at the poem and see if Claire’s followed her own advice (!). Here it is, reproduced with her kind permission:

What Lies Within

Like when you’re outside and the lights are on
inside churches and whatever faith there is
is fidgeting under the transept window
and you’re back with Nan, slipping fifty pence
into the collection box, fanning
the gilt-edged pages of your hymn book;

or when café chairs are stacked
and striped by sunlight behind the railings
of Pizza Express before it opens
and moorhens are splitting the blue water
of a river nearby and a waiter lights up
his first cigarette of the day;

or when there’s a row of shaving mirrors
at the barber’s, each tilted to an angle
a few degrees different from its neighbour
so there’s always another view of the sky,
another view of a woman smiling at something
the someone she’s walking with said;

or when, stepping from a taxi, you see
the fizz-torn dazzle of a streetlamp
in the buttery yellow of a pavement after rain
and girls’ heels chatter as umbrellas
are folded away and a maraschino cherry
gets dropped into a cocktail glass;

or when you dip your hand into a pond
at Kew and the koi flick and
tremble and whittle your fingers
with their cheese-grater teeth and you stare
and stare into the back of their eyes
looking for what lies within.

(See? I said it was a treat, didn’t I?)

The first line is clever, starting with “Like when” as if you’re in the middle of a conversation with the poet – it draws you in. The last line is stunning, suggesting the dimension of the soul and – yes – it makes you want to go back and read the poem again. When you do, you see the soul is in the city, as well as in the carp, and how cool is that?”

Some photos taken at the launch of the Lilies for Oscar Wilde display.

Many thanks to Haslams for hosting the launch, to Malmaison for wonderful food and Cllr Sarah Hacker. And of course, a rousing applause to all the artists who made flowers and to Marc Allridge from Cherubs for the amazing staging.

You can follow on FB and twitter: LiliesforOscarWilde

Here is a link to the LiliesforOscarWilde blog. http://liliesforoscarwilde.blogspot.co.uk/

Reading Museum in collaboration with Jelly, Reading Guild of Artists (RGA), Two Rivers Press, Whiteknight’s Trail, and many independent artists and ‘makers’ celebrate the wit and wisdom of Oscar Wilde by commemorating his birthday on Monday 16 October.

Local Reading artists and ‘makers’ joined forces to create some stunning lilies – using a range of materials, from ceramics to fabric, paper and plastic, found objects and recycled ones, to create a unique ‘bouquet’, designed and staged by award winning florist Marc Allridge.

The flowers will be debuting at Haslams, Friar Street, Reading on Monday 16 October.

This is a memoir by the first female professor in the UK, Edith Morley, Professor of English Language at the University of Reading. It’s an essential read for anyone exploring the history of women’s higher education in Britain, and for those keen on reliving the struggles of women to make headway in a profession that really wasn’t sure they ought to be there….

Rescued from the archives by Barbara Morris, this memoir was rejected by the first publisher Morley sent it to, in 1944 — probably because of the wartime restrictions on paper, ostensibly because Allen and Unwin told her that ‘those who don’t remember these things will have read of them often enough in novels of the period’. How fascinating to find that in the 1940s fiction was considered to be an adequate repository for women’s history. The memoir found its way to the university archive with the rest of Morley’s papers. Although she had clearly gone over the manuscript once or twice, annotating and clarifying here and there, she doesn’t seem to have made any other attempts to publish it. She died in 1964. The main building for the Humanities subjects at the university is now named after her.

SOUTH
is an independent poetry magazine, published twice yearly, which is run by a small team who give their time for the pleasure that gives them. It does not have or seek financial
support from any organisation or institution other than by the sale of subscriptions. It is grateful for the support of those who generously take out Foundation Membership or pay ordinary subscriptions. Further income is derived from the sale of individual copies of the magazine, especially at its half yearly readings.

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Geoff Sawers’ riverside walks at the weekend, Sept 17-18, 2017, were hugely well attended. Very well done indeed! A little bird suggested the numbers were about 20 walkers on Saturday and about 50 on Sunday.

Two Rivers press is delighted to have been involved with this activity and with the inaugural Reading on Thames festival.

Celebrate the launch of David Cliffe’s new book with a short talk by the author and an opportunity to watch archive footage taken in and around Reading in the early part of the 20th century. Excerpts include an advertising film about Huntley and Palmers biscuits, a film about a Second World War youth camp at Sonning Common, footage of a royal visit to Reading in the 1950s, a documentary about children’s health services about the same time, and pictures of Reading trams and trolleybuses and the widening of Station Hill in the 1930s. Also, possibly, an excerpt from The Thirty-nine steps which is said to have been filmed in Reading’s ‘Palace’ theatre.

Twenty different cinemas have graced Reading’s streets over the years, many long forgotten and some of the earliest very short-lived. In his book, David Cliffe tells the story of the era of the single-screen cinema in Reading, from the traveling shows at the turn of the 20th century, its heyday with the Vaudeville Electric Theatre in the 20s, through to today’s multiscreen entertainment ‘villages’.

David’s knowledge of the social history of Reading is extensive and there will be a chance to chat to the author afterwards, purchase books and have them signed.

David will also be signing his book and available to talk about it alongside a small exhibition of photographs at the Heritage Open Day events at Waterstones, Broad Street, Reading on Saturday 9th September at 12-1pm.

Picture Palace to Penny Plunge is published by Two Rivers Press in collaboration with the History of Reading Society.

“There is a quiet feminism at work here, celebrating that female characteristic of ‘managing small things’, the ability to make do, to ‘thrive on other people’s leftovers’, to be so much more than the product of men’s imaginings, ‘sweethearts, dolls… posable, blow-up generous… nice arse, a lovely pair’, as ‘Half the Human Race’ concludes, with an abruptness that emphasises how much more there is to be said: ‘…Say we’re all / of this and none of it and more, and this / is nothing like the end of it. Say’”

“Susan Utting’s new collection includes some forty new poems plus a selection from her three earlier books. There is so much here to enjoy…a collection whose generosity – eighty poems in total – is matched by the breadth and richness of the poet’s vision and by the sheer exuberance of her language.”

Becci Louise will be reading on Thames Festival as part of the #RiverCity conversations: Sat 16 Sept for a talk on ‘Murky Depths’ at 12.30 and a workshop 2-3pm. For more information click here.

Becci Louise, is a poet, performer and educator, and will captivate audiences both young and old with her verse-stories of an octopus who dreams of stars (and gets caught by a fisherman!) and you may even get to meet her tiny parrot, Maya. Let the magic of the watery worlds she conjures draw out the latent poet in you.

Octopus Medicine is poetry for the un-poetical. Deliberately subverting the typical view of poetry, it sweeps its way into strange and dreamlike narratives, calling upon the Octopus as a creature that represents loneliness, isolation, difference and the power of dreaming. These three narrative verses, all anchored around the central figure of the octopus, weave worlds designed to be shared by the young and old alike. This is poetry to heal the rift in society that means so many of our young and our old suffer from depression, from anxiety and from other mental health issues. Just like the ancient medicine animals of the old tribes, this is a book of prayers, incantations, totems and talismans.

Becci Louise, poet, performer and educator, will captivate audiences both young and old with her verse-stories of an octopus who dreams of stars (and gets caught by a fisherman!) and you may even get to meet her tiny parrot, Maya. Let the magic of the watery worlds she conjures draw out the latent poet in you.

Meet the author at the first of two free family friendly workshops:

Where: Waterstones, Children’s section

When: Saturday, 9th September, 2 – 3pm, as part of Heritage Open Days,

Becci Louise new book, Octopus Medicine is poetry for the un-poetical. Deliberately subverting the typical view of poetry, it sweeps its way into strange and dreamlike narratives, calling upon the Octopus as a creature that represents loneliness, isolation, difference and the power of dreaming. These three narrative verses, all anchored around the central figure of the octopus, weave worlds designed to be shared by the young and old alike. This is poetry to heal the rift in society that means so many of our young and our old suffer from depression, from anxiety and from other mental health issues. Just like the ancient medicine animals of the old tribes, this is a book of prayers, incantations, totems and talismans.

If you miss the Waterstones workshop on September 9th, Becci Louise will be reading on Thames Festival as part of the #RiverCity conversations: Sat 16 Sept for a talk on ‘Murky Depths’ at 12.30 and a workshop 2-3pm. For more information click here.

Twenty different cinemas have graced Reading’s streets over the years, many long forgotten and some of the earliest very short-lived. In his book, David Cliffe tells the story of the era of the single-screen cinema in Reading, from the traveling shows at the turn of the 20th century, its heyday with the Vaudeville Electric Theatre in the 20s, through to today’s multiscreen entertainment ‘villages’.

Celebrate the launch of David Cliffe’s new book with a short talk by the author and an opportunity to watch archive footage taken in and around Reading in the early part of the 20th century. Excerpts include an advertising film about Huntley and Palmers biscuits, a film about a Second World War youth camp at Sonning Common, footage of a royal visit to Reading in the 1950s, a documentary about children’s health services about the same time, and pictures of Reading trams and trolleybuses and the widening of Station Hill in the 1930s. Also, possibly, an excerpt from The Thirty-nine steps which is said to have been filmed in Reading’s ‘Palace’ theatre.

David’s knowledge of the social history of Reading is extensive and there will be a chance to chat to the author afterwards, purchase books and have them signed.

Meet on the river terrace of Crowne Plaza Hotel by Caversham Bridge. Saturday 16 September 11AM and Sunday 17 September 2PM. Free. Just turn up.

Join one of two guided walks along a majestic stretch of the Thames to learn more about Reading’s waterways flora and fauna, history and heritage. Geoff Sawers is an artist and poet inspired by his love of nature. Adrian Lawson has spent the last 30 years walking and cycling around Reading’s open spaces observing the wildlife that lives here, and he wrote about this for more than 20 years in the local paper.

Join them to discover more about the wonders of Reading’s natural landscape in a two hour circular walking tour of the Thames in central Reading.

If you can’t make the walks, buy the books and discover Reading at your leisure!

Follow the Thames from its meeting with the Kennet at Horseshoe Bridge up to Kings Meadow and reflect on the vivid imagery in Ian House’s poem ‘Masterstroke’ reproduced in individual phrases along the riverside in Sally Castle’s evocative hand-lettering. Fit the phrases into the context of the whole poem using the postcard guide to help and see the river in a whole new light.

The walk starts at Horseshoe Bridge where the Thames meets the Kennet, just east of Tesco. You walk at your own pace, whenever you like between Saturday 9 September – Sunday 17 September. It is completely FREE.

Artist Geoff Sawers is exhibiting his tree paintings from The Shady Side of Town: Reading’s Trees at CUP (the independent coffee shop next to St Mary’s Butts) during August. The perfect accompaniment to a good cuppa!

Plantlife, the wild plant conservation charity have reproduced two illustrations from A Wild Plant Year by Christina Hart-Davies as tea towels! Check them out in Plantlife’s online shop.

To buy a copy of A Wild Plant Year: The History, Folklore and Uses of Britain’s Flora click here.

A Wild Plant Year, is a lavishly illustrated, small-format, picture-led book covering 150-200 common wild flowers and plants, with text giving botanical information, history and folklore, medicinal or culinary uses.

The book is arranged in a through-the-year format, waymarked by festivals such as Easter, Mothering Sunday, Summer Solstice, Bonfire Night, etc. It follows a rough calendar, illustrating flowers and plants associated with each season and festival. The book has been designed spread by spread and the text is already drafted. The paintings are almost all completed, most of them made directly from life.

It is a sort of commonplace book, an ideal gift; something to dip into when relaxing, rather than a field guide.book on the cultural, social, folkloric and medicinal history of British wild plants. The perfect gift for any nature-lovers, nostalgia-buffs, folklorists and botanical-art-lovers as well as gardeners – though, in fact, hardly any garden plants are included; it’s all wild plants!

This weekend, Fri 30th June to Sunday 2nd July, Reading is Open for Art!

Our very own Geoff Sawers is exhibiting the paintings and drawings from The Shady Side of Town at 142 Castle Hill. (Opening event will be on Friday 30th, 12-1pm).

This fourth year of Open for Art celebrates design, the arts and creativity, from marking the 100 years since the birth of iconic British Designer, Lucienne Day to exhibiting the work of Reading’s emerging designers, artists, performers and makers of all ages. Come and join us whilst we lead you on walks, hear artists talks and poems, explore Reading’s hidden waterways, take part in Open Air art classes, create floral headdresses inspired by Frida Kahlo, follow the heritage paths and revel in performances. For more information on the events of the weekend, click here.

Two Rivers Press poet, Susan Utting, is interviewed by Juliet England, about deafness and poetry. Read the interview here. Two of Susan’s poems “Report to the Department of Audiology” and “Lip-reading the Poets”, appear with the interview. Both also appear in Susan’s most recent collection, Half the Human Race: New and Selected Poems.

The Shady Side of Town: Reading’s Trees by Adrian Lawson and Geoff Sawers is a quirky and inclusive guide to some of our finest and most interesting local specimens and is packed with fond facts and bold art…

Each tree in the book has been carefully chosen for its variety, diversity and uniqueness. It’s expressed in Adrian Lawson’s knowledgeable, loving prose accompanied by original, stark, imaginative painting from accomplished artist Geoff Sawers. They are a class double act…

This lovely compact volume is meant to make you get out there. So when in vacant or in pensive mood you can stuff it in your hoodie pocket and go and see for yourselves. There are well over thirty trees to visit: including such exotic sounding specimens as wild service, black poplar, cedar of Lebanon, Bhutan pine plus our lovely sweet chestnuts, oaks and other natives…

…the very reasonable £8.99 under-a-tennerness. Two pints worth of glorious local and profound knowledge throwing light into our cerebral and spiritual darkness is well worth it in my view.

And let’s not forget the man most at home
in sunlight, newly arrived in Cookham,

who walks with disciples up Cockmarsh Hill,
everyone in the crowd a plump angel.

Sir Stanley Spencer (1891–1959) was undoubtedly one of the most admired and influential English painters of the twentieth century. Cookham was a major influence on both his life and painting and his reference to the place as ‘a village in Heaven’ is reflected in his famous series of paintings of Biblical scenes featuring local people.

The 2017 Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition invited poets to find inspiration for their own art in the work of this remarkable man. “The Heaven that Runs Through Everything” is the winner of The Don and Jill Cawthorne Prize of The 2017 Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition. A selection from the entries to the competition is published in Stanley Spencer Poems An Anthology.

An English offering. There in the top
reach of the home meadow, near where it shades
into the scrub as sleep folds into sleep,
he burns the scraps of lamb as one might burn
raked leaves – drawn down and sheepish while he feeds
the pale flesh to the flame. And his wife runs

to him, the rumour of new life in her
like talk of a new war passing from lip
to lip. “In these days he has shown his favour,
and taken away my disgrace” he thinks
picturing heaven’s crisp ledgers. Men chop
wood, mend the hedges, build up the banks

set for the blessing of the October rain
that drops like a libation on the land.
Wind parts his wife’s white hair and sends a skein
of thin smoke skirling skywards, and the small
girl sees all this, sees it and understands
that signs and wonders happen over the wall.

Sir Stanley Spencer (1891–1959) was undoubtedly one of the most admired and influential English painters of the twentieth century. Cookham was a major influence on both his life and painting and his reference to the place as ‘a village in Heaven’ is reflected in his famous series of paintings of Biblical scenes featuring local people.

The 2017 Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition invited poets to find inspiration for their own art in the work of this remarkable man. “Zacharias and Elizabeth” is the winner of The Stationers’ Company Award of The 2017 Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition. A selection from the entries to the competition is published in Stanley Spencer Poems An Anthology.

And we saw someone passing below,
we who jammed the sash of each high window
like twins sprouted from a common waist.
And it was the quiet work below

we noticed first, something no one called
suffering, though it seemed what we’d been called
to bear. We watched ladders, crooked hands, heard
talk proceed as always, saw through old

remarkable eyes. Why, then, be startled
to find ourselves wingèd, some changed world
in the making along ivy and brick?
Someone pulled that slow cross to a hill.

Sir Stanley Spencer (1891–1959) was undoubtedly one of the most admired and influential English painters of the twentieth century. Cookham was a major influence on both his life and painting and his reference to the place as ‘a village in Heaven’ is reflected in his famous series of paintings of Biblical scenes featuring local people.

The 2017 Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition invited poets to find inspiration for their own art in the work of this remarkable man. “Christ Carrying the Cross” is the winner of The Maidenhead Advertiser Award of The 2017 Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition. A selection from the entries to the competition is published in Stanley Spencer Poems An Anthology.

To celebrate the awards for the Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition, 3 large pop-up display stands, each displaying one of the three prize winning poems are now on display in Holy Trinity Church, Cookham and provide an interesting perspective from which to read the poems. Everyone is more than welcome to drop in and read them.

“Stanley Spencer Poems. An Anthology” contains not only the three prize winners, but 75 other poems which highlight the amazing quality of the over 200 poems submitted to the judges. Order your copy here.

The blurb for The Last Day reads: “Since the end of her marriage, Vita has regained her happiness and remained civilised friends with her husband, Boyd. So much so that it seems natural – almost – for him to move back into their marital home as he goes through financial difficulties, even though he brings with him Honey, his beautiful and much younger new love. Vita is fine about it, she really is. But Honey isn’t just blonde hair and long, graceful limbs – she loves Boyd with a passion and is hiding secrets of her own.

…

Rebecca Lloyd, publisher at The Dome Press, said: “The Last Day has the tenderness of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel mixed with the edginess and unexpectedness of The Girl on a Train. It is touching and unnerving, with richly drawn characters and many-layered relationships that take you by surprise right till the end. I was hooked immediately. Claire is a huge talent.”

Doherty said: “I am absolutely delighted that The Last Day will be published by The Dome Press in 2018. The novel, focusing on the meaning of love in all its different ramifications and written with acute sensitivity, should attract a large audience.”

The Last Day will be published by The Dome Press in 2018. Put it on your to read list!

Susan Utting has had poetry published in The Times, TLS, The Independent, Forward Book of Poetry, The Poetry Review and Poems on the Underground. Her fourth poetry collection Half the Human Race: New & Selected Poems was published by Two Rivers Press in March. “Susan’s poetryexplores the social & biological struggles of being a woman, returning again and again to the thrills of being alive.” (Carrie Etter). She makes a welcome return to Loose Muse.

Jane Ulysses Grell is a poet and storyteller from the Caribbean island of Dominica, now living and working in London. A former teacher, Jane now works in a broad range of arts and community venues enthralling children and adults of all ages with her brand of poetry and storytelling in the African-Caribbean oral tradition. She has worked with BBC School Radio, published a Junior History and two books of poetry for children, and has recently published books of poems Praise Songs and White River Blues.

Lesley Saunders’ poem ‘Hazy, Massed, Dappled’ has been selected as the overall winner of the Candlestick Press/Cloud Appreciation Society (CAS) competition. It was picked by judge Katharine Towers, Candlestick Press Assistant Editor and CAS Poet in Residence, from over 600 poems submitted from all over the world.

The poem will be published in Candlestick’s forthcoming pamphlet Ten Poems about Clouds which is due for publication in July 2017 and will be featured on the Candlestick and CAS websites.

On May 1st, which is bank holiday Monday this year, we are launching a little (170x125mm) book by Adrian Lawson and Geoff Sawers on the trees of Reading: The Shady Side of Town: Reading’s Trees.

Thanks to the enthusiasm of Reading Tree Wardens and Nature Nurture, we will launch it at a special family-oriented tree festival in Caversham Court Gardens. There will be children’s activities run by Nature Nurture, tours of the gardens run by FCCG, bird song tours run by Adrian, wood turning and other crafts people and, of course, a gazebo full of our books. Please come join us.

Join us at the Poets’ Café to hear Susan Utting and other poets read their works.

Set up by Two Rivers Press poet, Susan Utting, 20 years ago, the Poets’ Café is Reading’s longest-running and best-loved poetry platform!

Held on the second Friday of each month at South Street Arts Centre, 21 South Street, Reading, RG1 4QU (map here), the night is made up of an open mic section where we welcome anyone to read their work in a friendly atmosphere, and a full reading by some of the country’s finest poets.

Doors open at 8 pm, poetry starts at 8.30 pm.

Entry costs £5 and £4 for concessions (including those reading in the open mic).

Only one one-page poem per poet in the open mic please!

Susan Utting will read from her new collection Half the Human Race: New and Selected Poems: buy your copy here.

Great Expectations on was jam packed. One person estimates there were a lot more than 60 there. It was standing room only! Barbara sold a lot of books! Susan received many thank yous and congrats by email and Facebook and says “I’m still in a state of euphoria!”

The eminent poet Alison Brackenbury was there, all the way from Gloucestershire, and others had come from the midlands, west country, north from Lancashire and Yorkshire – all over the place. K.Phelan, retired of Southern Arts, was there too.

Susan is planning to do a mini launch in Wokingham for local people who were so far back they couldn’t hear well, and some who couldn’t get in at all.

Susan thanked Two Rivers Press and said “I love the book, the typesetting, the cover design and am so grateful for all the backroom work (TRP) put in to make books and book launches happen!”

Come to the launch of poet Susan Utting‘s new collection, Half the Human Race: New & Selected Poems! This volume includes poems from three previous collections, alongside new work reflecting and developing earlier themes of the lives of women, particularly those who are too often overlooked, unseen, hidden, or silenced – women made to feel “sometimes we take up too much room”.

Under the chairmanship of Professor Peter Robinson, the judges of the “Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition” have announced the list of 76 poems, from the over 200 entries, which they have selected as being of a sufficiently high standard to merit publication in the special poetry anthology which will be published during the Festival in May of this year. This list will now form the basis for the creation of a final shortlist and, subsequently, for the selection of the three final prize winners of the overall competition. The top prize will be the “Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition Don and Jill Cawthorne Prize”, with a cash value of £2,500. The two runners’ up awards, the Stationers’ Company Award and the Maidenhead Advertiser Award, each carry a cash prize of £500.

The list of the 76 successful poems can be found on the Cookham Festival website at www.cookhamfestival.org.uk as of February 16, 2017.

Professor Robinson commented to the Advertiser: “I know that it has taken longer than we expected to release the titles of the 76 poems selected for the anthology. The standard of the entries was extremely high and coming to a fair and correct decision proved far from easy. I realise that a few weeks seems an age when you are waiting for the result, but the anthology will last for ever and we had to be certain that our choice was fair to both the entrants and the competition itself.”

Members of the public will have a chance to hear some of the selected poems being read during this year’s Cookham Festival, at a special poetry event to be held at Cookham Dean Village Hall on Friday 12 May. The anthology will also be launched at this event, with copies being available for sale. At the same time, the final shortlist will be announced, with the three prize winners being revealed at a special awards evening at the Stanley Spencer Gallery in Cookham on Friday 19 May.

You are invited to the first Oxford reading of Susan Utting‘s Half the Human Race: New & Selected Poems with special guests, Anna-May Laugher and Claire Dyer reading their own brand new and selected poems.

How do storms and extreme weather events affect us? Reflective, funny and poignant, the story of The Storm Officer invites you on a tumultuous and colourful journey, with wild scenes and original music. Featuring real-life accounts of Storm Desmond with tales of flooding, hurricanes and storms from the last thousand years.

This new theatre production from writer Matt Black was inspired and commissioned by the “Spaces of experience and horizons of expectation” (AH/K005782/1) project, which led to the TEMPEST database of extreme weather in the UK.

Directed by Martin Berry; produced by Antonia Beck; music by Julian Butt.
Created in association with Lakeside Arts, Kirkgate Arts, Arts Out West, Live and Local and supported by Arts Council England.

What better way for a poet to start the new year than to have a poem selected for Carol Rumen’s Poem of the Week column?

Jane Draycottphoto: Jemimah Kuhfeld / jemimahkuhfeld.co.uk

And so, 2017 is off to a fine start for Jane Draycott. Carol Rumen selected Jane’s poem, “Italy to Lord”, as her first poem of the week for 2017. It is a “…gentle, subtle reflection on a child’s-eye view of an encyclopedia’s exotic secrets is also a vision of a lost world” writes Carol. Here is the first stanza

Italy to Lord

It’s dark in here and forest green: Britannica,sixteen oak trees in a London living room,
the little girl, my mother, in the bookcase glass.
Italy, Ithaca, Izmail, Japan, each page a mainsail,
turning, HMS Discovery – none of the riversof southern Italy is of any great importance…

A truly pocket-sized history of Reading: 145 million years in 75 pages!

…how a landscape’s deep structures bear shapingly upon its surface textures – and how vital a sense of place is to our dreams, our visions, and the quiet practices of everyday life.

From the foreword by Robert Macfarlane (author of The Old Ways, Landmarks, Mountains of the Mind and The Wild Places)

Starting 145 million years ago, the geology of the natural landscape provides the context for Reading’s historical development. This book tells the town’s story in terms of its location at the junction of the rivers Thames and Kennet, its landform and the living requirements of its prehistoric inhabitants, medieval communities and industrial forebears. Did you know that Reading’s name is probably derived from ‘the place of the people of the red one’, an Anglo-Saxon settlement for which no physical trace remains?

Reading is a special place where multiple migrations, invasions, battles, plagues, wars, tragedies, songs, writings, artistic works, dogmas, festivities, industries, technologies and ideas have shaped both its people and the fabric of the town. Be a part of writing its next chapter by understanding its past.

Duncan Mackay is a former winner of the Henry Ford European Conservation Award for Heritage and former editor of the Twyford and Ruscombe Local History Society magazine. He has worked as Director of the South East region of the Countryside Agency; Environmental Manager for Berkshire County Council; and Deputy Secretary of the Commons, Open Spaces and Footpaths Preservation Society.

He has written 5 books and contributed to others including England in Particular and Bastions of Berkshire.

The title of Claire Dyer’s new collection is taken from a description of the Morpho butterfly’s wings which have reflective layers creating interference effects. As a result, the colour that the wings are seen as differs according to which viewing angle is used. It’s a coherent collection that aims to look for the extraordinary in the ordinary and see the familiar in a new way.

and, after looking closely at several poems in the collection, ends thus:

There lies the strength in these poems: their precise language opens and asks questions rather than providing neat, ordered conclusions. At first glance, they flutter into place like butterfly wings but it takes a second or closer reading to notice the engineering driving those wings and how the light reflects, enabling each reader to take away the patterns of light and shade that speak directly to them.

“The translation by Lesley Saunders of Poema, by the Portuguese writer and activist Maria Teresa Horta, recently took first prize in the Open category of the Stephen Spender prize for poetry in translation.”

The original poem and the winning translation can be read in this article that appeared in The Guardian, Monday, 28 November 2016.

Congratulations to Susan whose poem, ‘Opening the Windows’, was one of the 6 winning poems in the Poetry Society’s ‘Getting Out’ competition. Her poem will be featured in the winter issue (2016) of Poetry Newsand in her forthcoming poetry collection Half The Human Race, publishing March 2017.

Half The Human Race includes poems reflecting and developing themes of the lives of women, particularly those too often overlooked, unseen, hidden, or silenced – women made to feel “sometimes we take up too much room”.

The collection includes poems from three previous collections, alongside new work. Order your copy now.

We were so delighted to see the review of David Cooke’s poetry collection, A Murmuration in the TLS (August 19-26, 2016). Reviewer, John Greening wrote:

“The book is held together by love of place and a sober fascination with quirkiness, a study of a koala, a portrait of a Belizean woman in a pub, the English language itself…”
“There is much precision workmanship and a welcome lack of showiness in this collection from Two Rivers Press, whose publications are increasingly impressive.” Woohoo!

David’s collection was also reviewed in Poetry Salzburg.

Gill Learner’s Chill Factor received a favourable review in London Grip: ‘a rich and varied collection’. Mairi MacInnes’s ‘Amazing Memories of Childhood etc.’ featured in Raceme No. 4 and Mairi came down to Reading all the way from York last week to read in the inaugural Reading Literature Festival alongside Claire Dyer, Gill Learner and Kate Behrens.

It is with sadness that Two Rivers Press announces the death of Ulric Spencer – long time finance and accounts advisor to, as well as supporter of, the Press. He passed away after a short illness on November 4, 2016. The funeral is at Reading (Caversham) Crematorium on Tue 6th December at 13:45.

Prizewinners of the University of Reading’s first Creative Writing Competition, on the theme of ‘My ReadingL-R: Millie, Tamanna, Niyati, Edward.

Two Rivers Press would like to congratulate the winners of the University of Reading’s first Creative Writing Competition, on the theme of “My Reading”.

I’m delighted to say we had over 250 entries to University of Reading’s first Creative Writing Competition, on the theme of ‘My Reading’, says Dr Nicola Abram (FHEA) Lecturer, Department of English Literature, University of Reading and Officer for Widening Participation, School of Literature and Languages, University of Reading.

The winner was Tamanna Steven (The Holt School), and runner-up prizes were awarded to Edward Day (Gillotts School), Millie Phillips (Gillotts School), and Niyati Amin (The Holt School).

Thank you again for your kind sponsorship and provision of the quiz books as lovely, local prizes!

The Department of English Literature at the University of Reading invited submissions for its first Creative Writing Competition, on the theme ‘My Reading’ as part of the Reading Literature Festival and Reading Year of Culture 2016. For more information on the competition please see the University of Reading’s page about the competition.

The Festival runs a poetry competition each year and announces the winners at the festival. It is with great pleasure and not just a little button popping pride that we are able to announce that two of our Two River Press poets are prize winners:

Join us at 6.30pm on 25th October for the launch of the novel, September in the Rain (Holland House), by Peter Robinson, Two Rivers Press’ poetry editor.

Two young people travelling through Italy are caught in the rain, needing to hitch a lift…and nothing will ever be the same again. A book about responsibility and love, consequences and transformation.

This is event is free to attend but booking is essential; please RSVP through this page to reserve your place or call 01223 463200.

The 40 stations of BBC local radio marked National Poetry Day by each broadcasting a poem commissioned from 40 #BBCLocalPoets Each poet has adopted the voice of a characteristic local landmark or mascot: from Lincolnshire sausage (Gemma Baker, BBC Radio Lincolnshire) to Essex’s infamous A12 (Luke Wright, BBC Radio Suffolk).

For the last six years Christina Hart-Davies has been working on a book called A Wild Plant Year. It has been officially launched at a large botanical art exhibition of the same name in Hampshire.
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Exhibition – A Wild Plant Year

A solo exhibition is a major endeavour – especially when it comprises 234 paintings! ​All the artwork included in the book can be seen in the exhibition and it’s all for sale. There are also more original works by Christina for sale plus books, cards and prints.

We are delighted. A review of David Cooke’s poetry collection, A Murmuration, appeared in the TLS (August 19-26, 2016). Reviewer, John Greening wrote:

“There are distinct successes, such as the responses to Rodin’s “The Burghers of Calais” and Bruegel’s “Hunters in the Snow”, and translations from Mallarmé, Supervielle, Jaccottet and Rilke. The book is held together by love of place and a sober fascination with quirkiness, a study of a koala, a portrait of a Belizean woman in a pub, the English language itself…”

“There is much precision workmanship and a welcome lack of showiness in this collection from Two Rivers Press, whose publications are increasingly impressive. ”

I don’t think I have ever seen a more attractive or informative book than A Wild Plant Year by SWSBA member Christina Hart-Davies. Christina spent six years researching and illustrating the history, folklore and uses of Britain’s flora, and the result is nothing short of delightful.

Reflecting the seasonal appearance of over 200 wild flowers, the book starts with the New Year and finishes with Yuletide and Christmas, every plant taking its place in its particular season. On the way we are told about special days such as Easter, Mothering Sunday, Hallowe’en and so on, and showcasing the plants with which these days are associated. Every plant is beautifully illustrated with Christina’s characteristic delicacy and detail, embellished here and there with her gentle calligraphy.

I suppose it is pretty obvious when you think about it, but so many plant names reflect their character or use: Greater stitchwort (Stellaria holostea) was said to cure a stitch, that sudden pain in the side; Pignut (Conopodium majus) is adored by pigs and wild boar; Bee orchid (Ophrys aperifera) really looks as though it is hosting a visiting bee; Milkwort (Polygala spp) was supposed to increase the flow of milk in nursing mothers; Eyebright (Euphrasia spp) brightens the eyes. Broom (Cytisus scoparius) is self-explanatory, but although you probably already knew that it was used by witches to fly, did you also know that it was protection against them? And that its bright yellow edible buds were served at the coronation banquet of James II?

Take this book with you when you walk through the countryside and you will be amazed at the number of plants that either have a history, or a medical use, or are simply edible. Our forebears may not have had antibiotics and penicillin, but they certainly knew their herbs and what had healing properties or would spice up their diet.

Or stay at home and read it, enjoy the delightful illustrations – and increase your knowledge of the history, folklore and medical and edible values of our common (and not so common) wild plants.

As part of Reading’s Year of Culture 2016, and to coincide with national Heritage Open Days, RG Spaces put on an exhibition of art and beautiful books, including Two Rivers Press books, at The Turbine House. celebrating Reading’s two rivers, the Kennet and the Thames.

The Turbine House is a unique building that spans the Kennet, with waterside views towards Reading town centre. It houses preserved turbine machinery and hosts occasional summertime art exhibitions and events.

Waterstones Reading Broad Street is thrilled to welcome the author, Professor Peter Robinson, Professor of English and American literature at Reading University, as he launches his first novel ‘September in the Rain’.

Two young people travelling through Italy are caught in the rain and hitch a lift with chilling consequences.

This is a book about the responsibilities of love; about accidents and decisions; about choices and dilemmas.

As part of Reading’s Year of Culture 2016, and to coincide with national Heritage Open Days, RG Spaces invites you to an exhibition of art and beautiful books at The Turbine House. The exhibition celebrates Reading’s two rivers.

Step out over the Kennet River – in this Victorian Turbine House with a great view of the weir originally built by monks from Reading Abbey – to see an exhibition of work by 16 local artists on Reading and its Rivers, specially curated for Heritage Open Days. It will be complemented by books from Two Rivers Press, a family trail around this little nook of Reading history, and special deals at nearby restaurant, the Bel and the Dragon.

Additional information: Park in Bel and the Dragon car park which is shared with the small museum which is also onsite (free entry).

Directions: From Reading Town Centre, walk down the Kennet towpath (about 15 minutes). By car or if walking from the station, along Forbury Road at the roundabout by Homebase/Reading jail, follow the brown signs to Blakes Lock Museum down Kenavon Drive. Turn right when you see the Bel and the Dragon restaurant and enter through its car park.

Lavishly illustrated with detailed, vibrant watercolours the book will be launched with a major solo exhibition. All the illustrations will be for sale, along with books, prints, cards and other original paintings.

29th August 2016: Ian Brinton, reviews Peter Robinson’s most recent novel September in the Rain, for Tears in the Fence, an independent literary magazine’s, blog.

It is a tale of two young people travelling through Italy, caught in the rain, needing to hitch a lift…and nothing will ever be the same again. It is a tale of responsibility and love, consequences and transformation.

“IT WAS A GOOD IDEA to collect together Ruth Speirs’ translations of Rilke…

The insistence she makes is that sense has priority, because Rilke’s word choice was precise rather than impressionistic or ornamental. Her task was then to show exactly what Rilke was doing with language at every point of the text. The sense lay in the knots and gaps but also in the reach of the sentence, both involved in the perceptual discoveries made in the writing, which must be rendered free of both obfuscation and reductive forms of clarity. There are no doubt failures, and there are indecisions, but for the most part the result is a balance which even more recent experts cannot seem to manage without wooden awkwardness—…

Ruth Speirs’ Rilke cannot become anyone’s definitive English Rilke, since the impossibility of a book meant that she made no attempt to cover all Rilke’s major works. The Duino Elegies are all here, but only twenty of the Sonnets to Orpheus, with a generous selection from New Poems and a scatter of earlier poems. But as a check on and comparison with other translations I think it would be extremely useful.

An extract from a review which appears in Part Two of an extended essay by Peter Riley on translated poetry, Poetry Notes, published in The Fortnightly Review.

We are very sorry to announce the death of the poet, publisher, and street band drummer David Attwooll, whose first collection, The Sound Ladder, we published in 2015. Shortly before his sudden decline, plans had been put in place to publish a second collection in October 2017. Work on this second collection will continue with the aid of David’s family and colleagues. Our condolences go to his wife and children for their loss. Among David’s many achievements, he was Chairman of the Board for Liverpool University Press. A full obituary notice can be found on their website here.

On Sunday, 17 July 2016, Two Rivers Press hosted a Literary Lunch at the Great Expectations Pub on London Street, Reading. Poet Gill Learner read from her new collection, Chill Factor. Other Two Rivers Press authors and editors, Barbara Morris and Peter Robinson, read from other recent TRP publications including:

Join us on Sunday 17th July at the Great Expectations Pub on London Street, from 12pm. Gill Learner will be launching her new collection: Chill Factor this Sunday.There will be a tab behind the bar for the first round of drinks and you can have your lunch there too.

As well as hearing Gill, you will also have the opportunity to hear Barbara Morris read from Edith Morley’s memoir, Before & After and Peter Robinson read from Mairi MacInnes’s Amazing Memories of Childhood, etc. So it really will be a literary lunch.

In 1908, Edith Morley was appointed Professor of English Language at University College Reading – the institution that eventually became the University of Reading. Professor Morley’s autobiographical sketch, ‘Looking Before and After’ was recently published as ‘Before and After: Reminiscences of a Working Life‘ ….

This is, without a doubt, one of the finest books that I have read all year (so far), telling the story of a remarkable person and a remarkable life, giving a highly personal insight in the history of my own employer as well as the struggles it took a female academic at the time to establish herself in an overwhelmingly male-dominated environment (and many a time, while reading this fine piece, I wondered what progress had been made in some areas).

Professor Kruschwitz goes on to posit that Professor Morley was “someone who developed a feminei sexus odium, a hatred for (her) female sex, due to her society’s overall gender expectations”? The evidence, he says, is there in the very first couple of pages of the actual memoirs (p. 11-2):

‘But I did hate being a girl and can still remember my indignation at hearing my brother told that only girls cheated at games and the like, or cried when they were hurt. And how I hated and resented wearing gloves. When quite small I suffered from a thick woollen veil, which was supposed to safeguard the complexion, but my very noisy and voluble protests soon relieved me of that infliction – old-fashioned and unusual in those days. I also resented and constantly disobeyed the rule that I must not slide down the banisters or turn head over heels! I had gymnastic lessons, however, and learned how to swim, but I yearned for more of the team games which girls did not yet play and suffered a good deal from insufficient outlets for my physical exuberance.’

Two Rivers Press had a wonderful time hosting their little bit of the 2016 Whiteknights Studio Trail. Books were displayed, authors chatted about their books, and everyone was invited to make a bookmark with one of Peter Hay’s stamps.

M.White, author of “The Veiled Vale” (L), talks about the book

If you didn’t make it to us this year, make sure you come to see us next year!

The Vale of the White Horse and the beautiful countryside of South Oxfordshire is a landscape steeped in thousands of years of legends, history and mystery. Here are witches, monsters and ghosts; old legends and modern-day tales of strange encounters with the unknown. From the mildly curious to the frighteningly inexplicable, The Veiled Vale is a treasure trove of fabulous folklore and modern mysteries.

The author, Mike White, will also be at the Whiteknights Studio Trail to talk about and sign copies of his book: Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th June 2016 11am – 6pm

Thursday 12th May. South’s launch of issue 53, featuring poems by Two Rivers Press authors and poets, John Froy, Gill Learner, Jean Watkins and reviews of collections by David Attwooll and David Cooke will take place in Reading Central Library (Abbey Square, Reading, RG1 3BQ) 7-7.30pm.